so i started another thing partially because clexa and the100 have taken over my life (and ya know, with all the free time i don't have). here goes.

a huge thank you and shout-out goes to my wonderful beta, meredith (imjustakoalabear on tumblr)!

find me on tumblr at buildyourownarchitecture

:)

"Oh. Crap."

"Raven!" Clarke snapped, turning her head to look down the staircase at her friend. "You are supposed to be helping, not breaking my stuff."

The other girl gave Clarke a glare. "I'm trying. Maybe if you didn't pack the entire world…"

"I won't be home until Christmas break. I had to pack everything, moron."

"Stop calling me names or I'm going to stop helping you!"

Clarke groaned and held the door open when she got to the top of the steps. "Yeah, yeah, come on, slow poke."

After letting Raven walk through the door (and ignoring the glare and dramatic showcase of her brace sent her way), Clarke grabbed the suitcase she had let sit on the ground and re-situated the rest of her belongings that were in her arms.

"Which way?" Raven asked her.

"Through that door, I think…this is 305, so I'm probably down at the other end."

Groaning, Raven glared again. "Why, of course you are."

"You know, you could have just stayed back at the hotel with my mom if you were going to be this much of a pain in my a-"

Before Clarke could finish talking, she saw her wallet sliding off of the box she was carrying. Making a grab for it with the hand that held her suitcase, she accidentally hit the bottom of the box and sent pictures, books, and other random things that were stored inside flying everywhere.

"Shit," she muttered, cringing as everything made a rather loud crashing noise.

Raven was busy cackling and mocking her, while Clarke scrambled to pick some of her things up. "Can you please stop finding ways to make this day worse and get down here to help me?"

Helping Clarke (helping meaning chucking random art supplies, pictures, and whatever the hell the rest was) quickly refill the box, Raven grimaced every time she came across a picture of Clarke in high school, waiting for the inevitable one of Finn and her to appear.

Noticing her best friend's face, Clarke finished placing her things back inside the box and stood up, pulling Raven with her. "I'm not going to crack," she promised, gripping the brunette's shoulders. "He was my first love and losing him was terrifying and heart wrenching and…" Pulling back, Clarke toyed with her hands and blinked to rid herself of any chance of oncoming tears. "I'm still healing, but things are a lot more patched up than they were a year ago. I appreciate the concern and the love, I do, but I need you to stop walking on eggshells with everything Finn related. If you stop, everyone else will, too."

Taking a moment and following Clarke's eye movements, Raven let her frown form a more neutral position on her face. Quickly hugging the other girl, Raven whispered an "I'll try" in her ear before promptly pushing her away and rolling her eyes. "If you want to get the shit out of your car in enough time to make your stupid 'welcome back' event, you better get your ass in gear!"

Checking her phone's screen for what felt like the hundredth time in the last two minutes, Clarke continued running, ignoring the burn in her legs and sweat dripping down her neck, probably ruining her hair and any composure she was hoping to have. She had forgotten how stifling the heat could be in Polis. Polis College was about three hours from the North Carolina coast, but that didn't stop the town from feeling as if the sun was literally swallowing everyone whole until at least mid-September.

Clutching her lanyard and phone, Clarke tore up the steps of the Polis student center, ripped the door open after slamming her id card against the reader (rolling her eyes as she did so, because, really who wanted to sneak into the student center before school started up again), and flew down the steps, slowing her pace two-thirds of the way down to avoid looking like a complete idiot.

After a quick first glance around the empty cafeteria, she realized slowing down was done entirely in vain and sprinted across the room. "Bellamy!" Slamming on the brakes and flying into his arms, Clarke clutched around his neck.

Feeling Bellamy reach around to place the cup he was carrying on the counter behind them, Clarke peeled herself off of him. "Hi," she whispered, bright smile lighting up her face.

Smiling back at her, Bellamy found his arms pulling Clarke into another hug. "Hi, princess."

Someone clearing their throat, rather obnoxiously, caused the pair to finally disentangle. A quick glance to his left told Bellamy how he was going to respond before the person near them even opened his mouth.

"So," Wick began, raising an eyebrow suggestively. "Who's the fresh meat?"

Rolling his eyes, Bellamy began to say something, but Clarke's voice interrupted him. "I'm not fresh meat, jag off. I do have a name. It's Clarke. And, ew, Bellamy is my cousin, but thanks for leaving me with that nauseous feeling in the pit of my stomach."

Eyebrows raised with an impressed look on his face, Wick stuck out his hand. "Well that's that I guess. I'm Wick. Senior, second floor of Dune."

Sighing and reminding herself to give this guy a second chance at a first impression, she stuck her own hand out to shake. "Clarke. Sophomore, third floor Cepa."

Wick was already pulling away and grabbing his plate to walk back to the conference room, where their welcome back event was being held, when he snorted loudly. "Good luck with that."

Once he was far enough out of earshot, Clarke turned toward Bellamy, swiping his drink and trying to multitask and quickly decide what she wanted to eat. "What did he mean by that?" she asked, reaching for a spoon to dish out pasta.

"Ignore him," Bellamy began, finishing making his own plate (full of things Clarke could vomit at the thought of being mixed together). "He was referring to Lexa, but she's great. He's just an ass and gets himself into a constant state of trouble."

"The head RA Lexa? Sexy, straight-faced Lexa? She's in my building?"

"Top floor," Bellamy provided, smirking when Clarke almost burned herself putting broccoli onto her plate after hearing him. "I reserve the right to tease you about this later, but we should probably head back. I can just hear Kane's speech about tardiness from here."

Trying to play it cool and following Bellamy down the hall, Clarke tried to identify what exactly was making her stomach erupt in dinosaur-sized butterflies. Rolling her eyes at herself, she gave up her internal debate. She was nervous about starting this damn job to begin with and now the upperclassman who she was enamored with was not only her supervisor, but also living directly two floors above her.

Sliding into a seat next to Bellamy, Clarke glanced around the room, waving at her friends and those she knew and trying to remember the names of the older RAs. Octavia, Bellamy's sister and her cousin, got written up enough for Clarke to know all of their social security numbers and life aspirations. She should have been able to remember everyone's name, at the very least, but all she could think about was that Lexa was nowhere to be found.

Before she could really over-analyze her crush missing in action, the brunette glided, literally glided, into the room, setting a salad and tea down at a table with a few other upperclassmen, and sweeping her eyes across the room. With a slight head nod, which probably would have gone unnoticed by everyone in the room had it not been for Clarke's eagle eye on the girl, Lexa walked to the middle of the space.

"Hello, everyone. Welcome back."

"Hey, partner!"

Clarke glanced to her left, where Bellamy was seated. Cringing in both embarrassment and with the realization that Bellamy was the other head RA and would be working closely with Lexa all year, Clarke tried to not sink down into, or under for that matter, her seat. Hiding her face with her hand, she quietly groaned. When she gathered enough composure to glance back to the center of the room, Lexa was sporting what Clarke thought was the first and only smile she'd ever seen cross the girl's face. Bellamy kicking her under the table helped her realize that smile was directed at her and any thought of keeping the blush out of her cheeks flew out the window. Smiling back, Clarke playfully swatted at her cousin. "Ignore him. I promise he's not always this weird."

Lexa threw a nod in her direction and although the smile had left her face, Clarke noticed the light and humor in her eyes. Maybe this whole RA thing would be a lot better than she had anticipated.

Laughter falling out of her mouth, Clarke spun a 180 and almost choked on air. The group was playing a series of 'get to know you' games, currently conquering Two Truths and a Lie, and Lexa was now standing smack dab in front of her. Partially too caught up in the fun she was having, Clarke continued laughing. "Hi," she greeted, eyes shining at Lexa and watching, with delight, as the right side of her mouth curled up into a half smile.

"Hello, Clarke."

"I'm really glad I chose to do this," Clarke blurted, wishing she wouldn't look even more like an idiot if she slammed a hand over her mouth. "Uh…"

"I'm glad you are enjoying yourself," Lexa purposefully added, saving the blonde from any further embarrassment. "You come highly recommended."

"Oh?"

Lexa answered with another nod.

"I hope you don't mean by Bellamy, because, well, if you have that much faith in him, you're going to be really let down this year," Clarke joked, watching Lexa bow her head in what seemed like a chuckle, brown curls covering her face in the process. "So," Clarke continued, finally noticing her heart rate and reprimanding herself for not thinking of better statements for this stupid game. If she knew she'd eventually pair up with Lexa, she would have spent all fucking summer thinking of the two absolute coolest things about herself and a really great lie that didn't sound like she was making herself out to be a wannabe badass.

"You can go first," Lexa offered, abruptly pulling Clarke out of her thoughts.

'Great,' Clarke thought. 'Of course I can.' "Okay, hm. I'm an art therapy major, I'm from Pitt-"

Clarke's jaw almost dropped when Lexa cut her off. "If you are going to use statements like that, we may as well skip your turn."

"What do you mean?"

"Clarke, I hired you. I know your major and where you are from."

Frowning, Clarke balled her lips into the corner of her mouth and wracked her brain. "Okay fine. What makes me most sad is that my dad won't be able to walk me down the aisle when, well if, anyone ever wants to marry me. I think water is thicker than blood. And I'm so terrified of swimming that I have been forging notes to get me out of swim classes since high school."

Wishing the look on Lexa's face was more 'challenge accepted' rather than sheer shock, quickly masked by composure, Clarke internally kicked herself, hard, as the words she just blurted out kept flying through her brain.

"I don't-"

"Ohhhhh the commander is stumped! Hurry up and lose the round so we can move on! You two are the only ones not finished yet," the pair heard.

"Quiet, Anya," Lexa snapped, eyes swiping back to Clarke's face as the group's chatter began up again.

"You think blood is thicker than water. That one was a lie."

Allowing a smirk to frame her face, Clarke shook her head, watching Lexa's eyes follow the gentle swish of her ponytail. "Wrong, although nice try since, ya know, Bell and all. I've only been forging notes to get out of swimming since college."

Almost calling Clarke out on her use of a tricky play on words, Lexa decided not to. The immediate mist that covered the blonde's eyes as she finished telling Lexa her lie did not seem like an appropriate sign to go ahead and push the envelope. In fact, as she watched Clarke blink away threatening tears, Lexa realized there was much more to the girl's swimming story than she felt equipped to handle right now.

Realizing she should up her own game, Lexa took a moment to brainstorm, but ended up half-assing her statements, for more reasons than she could count. "My favorite show in Teen Mom, I would probably, actually, and seriously harm someone to steal their Rita's Water Ice, and I like to eat squid."

Snorting, Clarke shook her head. "You do not. No way. And your favorite television show is definitely Teen Mom."

"I…" Cocking her head to the side, Lexa realized she had just inadvertently mortified herself in front of a girl she had realistically known for only 45 minutes. "You can't tell anyone that."

Still laughing, but trying her hardest to reign herself in, because, hello, the girl in front of her was stunning and smart and kinda her fucking boss, Clarke stuck out a pinky. "Promise." Noticing the confused look fall across the taller girl's face, Clarke scoffed. "Please tell me you've pinky promised before? What kind of human are you?"

Sneering, Lexa quickly twisted their pinkies together before taking two steps back. "Of course I have," she lied, ignoring the way Clarke's left eyebrow rose in speculation. "Now if you'll excuse me, I need to instruct everyone on our next activity."

Falling in line with everyone else in the room, Clarke tried to keep the smirk off her face. Lexa was busy blabbing, well blabbing in as few (entirely too formal) words as possible, the directions to their next 'get to know you' game, but all Clarke's could think about was how fun this year actually could turn out to be, if she played her cards right.